Successful IT strategic plans

To craft an effective IT strategic plan, you have to know where the company will be in the next five years, what shape its business will take, and how its business model and customer base will evolve. But creating a picture of that "target state" can be challenging. It's the CIO's job to help the business shape this "target state" to the point where IT management can plan how technology will help enable the company's future. That means asking the right questions in the areas of company growth strategy, products and services strategy, volume growth strategy, mergers and acquisitions strategy, partners and channel strategy and IT growth strategy. These aren't easy questions to answer, there may be multiple answers to the questions, and some questions may have no hard answers. But the answers create a basis for the IT organization to develop a strategic plan that's aligned with the company's goals.

Read more about effective IT strategic plans:
- read the blog at CIO

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